Regardless of global warming sceptics, planet Earth is talking to us and what she has to say is not at all reassuring. Slowly, and yet still too rapidly, the planet is suffocating under the pressure of human activity. Is the glass full? No. The pandemic has given us an eye-opening look on a new threat: viruses can mute faster than the vaccines produced to fight them. In a world where its end has been prophesied since the beginning of time, how are we to survive if not together by working hand in hand on problems that unite us.
On a small scale, business owners experience it on a daily basis. To move forward, to successfully complete their projects and to make their business grow, they must count on their employees, people of all races and religions, people with different orientations and interests. The responsibility of uniting these people in a common purpose lies with business leaders.
Jacques Gagnon, the CEO of Imagem, a firm that specializes in the development of technologies in the healthcare sector knows a thing or two on the subject. For more than 25 years, he has built on the know-how of his team and utilized their expertise to support the healthcare network and its professionals through two software suites, Postscriptum and Interview, fully developed by Imagem.
According to him, this way of doing things, of uniting and pulling forces together, should also be put into practice in the world of politics.
Gagnon says that one cannot impose his or her way of thinking, but some form of leadership must be exercised to show that we are more efficient when we work together. It is possible for people to talk and to stand united; you just need to find the right words to do so. What we need right now is global leadership. We need to unite and build on our similarities, and Gagnon believes there are many. We need to stop talking about our sources of conflict. We need to find a meeting point.
Day after day, business people use diplomacy, assume leadership, show open-mindedness and manifest an intense desire to find lasting solutions. Maybe this should be taken into account to face head on the current and future global threats.
The Challenges of Globalization
As stated by Gagnon, the COVID-19 crisis has been a vivid demonstration of much stinginess, particularly with regard to vaccines. As it has been the case so many times since we’ve become “globalized”, the most powerful in the world take what they think they are entitled to leaving the less fortunate to their fate. Gagnon uses Haitian people and all poor countries as an analogy, as if we can leave all of them without vaccines. Have we become that much desensitized to misery? asks Gagnon.
Unfortunately, a small committee of people cannot resolve the COVID-19 pandemic or all the environmental issues we face. These issues are subjects of worldwide concern; they are global problems and must be addressed as such.
Gagnon maintains that the greatest threat we face is not natural disasters or viruses; our greatest threat is ourselves and our inability to face problems together. We seem to be unable to unite around a common priority. The contempt we have for others prevents us from sitting and working together.
Yet, Gagnon says that when he sees artistic and musical performances reach people all over the world, when he sees Innus moved by the OSM, when he sees Japanese moved to tears by the music of Beethoven, when he sees the unanimity of sentiment before these splendours, he believes that salvation of humanity is possible.